Vodka And Burnt Out Matches
by starsnuffers
Summary: Nick, a famous trumpet player trying to live a normal life as a teenager interning for a symphony orchestra, runs into many problems when he flips the principal trumpet player's car and loses all of his memory...
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1**

"Hey, Nick."

I heard a voice. Where was it coming from?

"Nikholaous, sweetie, are you awake?"

More whispers from a familiar voice. My eyes were still closed and I had no idea what was going on. After pondering this, I decided I was too tired to open my eyes. Whoever is calling me will just have to wait.

However, I'm rather curious. If I were a cat, that would be bad. I slowly open my eyes. It's way too bright for my liking, so I close them.

"You must be really tired, huh, cutie?"

What was this?! Someone was BABYING me!? I am NOT five, I'm seventeen!

… I think.

Whoa, hold the show. Who the hell am I?

I have to open my eyes. Curiosity is getting the best of me.

I see a tall woman, probably about the age of thirty, with dirty blonde hair tied up neatly into a ponytail with her side-swept fringe hanging down across her forehead standing next to me. She wears salmon-coloured scrubs with a stethoscope hanging from her neck. Who the hell wears salmon-coloured scrubs? I decide almost immediately that she's a doctor or a nurse, but why is she standing next to me? How does she know my name? Do I know her? And where the bloody hell am I?

"Hey you," she smiles. "Good afternoon."

I don't say anything back and instead look around. I was in a hospital. But the walls were yellow and had fluffy pink bunnies painted on them. Holy shit, I AM five!

Slightly hysterical, I turn to the strange woman. "How old am I?"

"Seventeen," she replies and puts her hand on my shoulder. "Sit up for me?"

I do as she says, slightly wincing from the pain it caused me.

"Oh…" I trail off. "Then, uh, not trying to be rude, but what's with the bunnies and cuteness?"

She laughs a bit. "I wanted to keep an eye on you here." Confusion. She places the stethoscope on my back. "Deep breaths."

I breathe in once and cry out in pain. "Ow!"

She frowns. "Lie back down."

I slowly do so. "Do I … know you?" I hesitantly ask.

She nods. "I'm Celeste, your sister-in-law. I work here in pediatrics, so that's why you're here."

"Oh. Then I must have a brother somewhere in the picture."

"You have three. Well... two."

"What?"

Her bright face turned dark. "Nick, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have brought it up."

"Brought what up? What? Who?"

Celeste turns away as her eyes start to water.

"Did someone die? Is that why I'm here? Did something happen to us? You're not telling me anything."

She turns back, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. "No one died yesterday."

"Then someone died some other time. I'm guessing someone we love. I'm guessing a brother."

Sadly nodding, she tells, "It was a long time ago. You always wanted to forget it and I figured we just wouldn't ever bring it up ever again since you lost your memory yesterday but I ruined it, and I'm really, really sorry. I'm," sob, "really," sob. Then she loses herself into a bout of sobbing and buries her face into my chest.

I pat her on the back. "There, there. It's okay."

Celeste stands back up, pulling herself back together. She takes the bottom of her shirt and uses it to wipe away the tears. She sniffs. "I'm sorry."

I look up at her, sadness present in my eyes. "Look, I have no idea who you are, or really who I am, but it's okay. I'm not mad at you. It's fine."

She looks up and sighs, blowing some of her fringe out of her eyes. "Okay." She wipes her eyes again and then turns back to me. "How are you feeling?"

I shrug. "I don't really feel anything except everything's kinda sore. Am I sick? Is that why I'm here?"

"You flipped a car," she tells me, putting her hand on my shoulder as a comforting gesture.

I raised my eyebrows. "Am I really that bad of a driver?"

She shakes her head. "There was a storm and I don't really know what happened."

"Well neither do I."

"I think Anthony might know."

"Who?"

"Your boss."

"My boss?"

"You were driving him home."

"I was driving an adult home?"

"He was drunk."

"Makes sense… is he okay?"

"Better off than you."

"Am I supposed to be mad at him? Do I like him?"

"You love him."

"Are we a couple?!"

"Ew! No! He has a wife and kids! You guys are just really close buddies."

"I'm buddies with my boss? Aren't bosses supposed to be assholes?"

"You play the trumpet."

"I play the trumpet?"

"Yes."

"Is that relevant?"

"Yes. You intern at a symphony."

"I intern?"

"That's why you guys are buddies. You sit next to him every day at work. You share music."

"Huh…"

"You okay?"

"Yeah. I just… this is a lot to process and my head hurts. A lot. Actually, everything hurts…"

She flashes me a sympathetic smile. "You're allergic to morphine. It's gonna hurt like hell for awhile."

"You're nice," I retort sarcastically.

"You hate it when I lie to you."

"Well, I guess this is better than being built up with lies. What else can you tell me?"

"I think you should rest."

"I meant about my life. Where do I live? Am I nice? Do I like puppies? Do I have a girlfriend?"

"You live in California. You are generally a nice person. You have three dogs and a cat. And you have a boyfriend."

"I'm gay?"

"Flamingly."

"That's… nice. So, where is said boyfriend? Should he not be sitting at my bedside waiting anxiously for me to wake up?"

"He's on tour. You know how those superstars are!"

"I'm dating a famous person?" I ask. Pretty kick ass, if I do say so myself. "I find that rather hard to believe."

She laughs, smugly smiling. "You better believe it. You're rather popular yourself."

"Me? Popular?" I ask, pointing to myself. I seem like your average Joe. Not someone anyone would have posters of plastered to their walls in their bedroom.

Celeste grabs the TV remote from the table by my bed and types in '13.' The TV switches from the Animal Planet to E! News.

The TV was playing a clip of two guys wearing sunglasses with baseball caps on, rushing away from flashing lights and screaming girls with smoothies in hand.

"Who are they?" I ask.

"That's you," she says, pointing to the guy in the red skinny jeans, black sweater, and black and white scarf getting into a car. She points to the other guy. "And that's Sasha, your boyfriend." Sasha was wearing blue jeans, UGG boots, and a sweater with reindeer on it. He wore blue-framed glasses that were slightly crooked. He smiled really goofily at some of the girls surrounding what I guessed was my car and my expression doesn't change. I look ahead like no one is there.

"My boyfriend looks really dorky," I say, shocked by how fabulous I looked, and how _unfabulous_ he looked.

Celeste nods. "That's why you love him."

I wrinkle my nose in disgust. "Ick."

"Don't say that. You two are adorable."

I keep watching the TV. It's muted so I can't hear a word anyone's saying, but it switches from pictures of us to a dark, rainy setting with flashing blue and red lights. Ambulances.

Celeste turns off the TV.

I turn to her. "I wanna see that!"

"No," she says, throwing the remote on the chair across the room, "you don't."

"Wha?"

"The video has been playing all day. It's so gross."

"So what _did_ happen to me?"

She sits down in a chair next to me. "You and Anthony went to a work party last night and he assigned you as designated driver, so when he got too drunk to stand up straight, you drove him home in his giant Republican mobile. All I know is that you flipped it because it was raining and the roads were slippery."

"Shit," I curse. "Is he okay?"

"He's still sleeping. He had to have surgery to fix his foot."

"What happened to me?" I ask. "Did I have to have surgery too?" I yawn. It feels like it's three in the morning.

She nods. "You hit your head pretty hard, which is why you can't remember anything. And you weren't wearing a seatbelt. You got really injured. You had to have surgery to fix the internal bleeding."

"Ouch," I mutter.

"Broken leg, two broken ribs, broken wrist, broken memory… Why didn't you wear a seatbelt?"

I shrug. "Don't ask me. I can't remember anything."

She sighs.

I close my eyes. This was all a lot to digest.

"You should sleep. You must be tired," she tells me.

I nod.

Celeste stokes my hair gently. "You'll be okay. I promise."

"Mmhmm," I mutter, too tired to say anything coherent.

She kisses my forehead. "Sleep well. Here's your panda."

I open my eyes far enough to see a plush panda wearing a marching band uniform being pushed at me. I take it and hold onto it. It was comforting.

"You like pandas. A lot."

"Oh really now?"

"Yep. Night, cutie."

"Night."


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

"FUCK!" I holler out.

Celeste grabs my hand. "Hold my hand. It's gonna be okay."

"Shit, shit, shit!" I curse. "Aghhh!"

Of all the times I've been in pain, this has got to be the worst I've ever felt.

I start breathing heavily and unevenly, heaving, which made the pain in my chest just that much worse. I put my left hand over my eyes, blocking out the light, trying to make my immense headache go away.

Celeste, still holding my right hand, gently strokes it with her thumb.

"YOU'RE NOT HELPING!" I lash out at her, yanking my hand away. I lie on the floor of my bathroom, whimpering. "Take me back to the hospital," I beg. "Have them put me in a coma."

"I can't…" she trails off. She sounds close to tears.

I open my eyes and look over at her. "Don't you _dare_ cry! You're not the one dying over here!"

"I'll go get Beau," Celeste says, starting to stand up.

I grab her arm. "Don't leave! That damn dentist kid can't do anything anyway!"

Of all the useless professions in the universe, my older brother just _had_ to become an orthodontist. He calls himself a doctor. Ha! He glues metal on people's teeth.

"What do you want me to do?" she asks.

I close my eyes and swallow hard. "There's a baseball bat in the garage. Get it and hit me in the head really hard with it."

"No!" she protests. "I'm not going to! I took an oath to do no harm!"

"You're doing me harm by having me lie here in agony. It's been a week, Celeste, an entire week! I can't take it anymore! Can't I just kill myself already!?"

"You are not going to kill yourself."

"Give me a gun. Please. End my torture."

She stands up. "I'm getting Beau."

"I. HATE. BEAU."

She leaves anyway.

I close my eyes and concentrate on my breathing. Heavy, shallow breaths is the only type of breathing I can seem to do at the moment, so I breathe and gasp, breathe and gasp.

Next thing I know, my ginger-haired brother is sitting next to me. "Nick," he starts.

"Go away!" I yell.

"Nick…"

"GET THE BLOODY HELL AWAY FROM ME!" I scream and smack him as hard as I can with the back of my hand.

"Shit!" he cries out. "That hurt!"

"YOU KNOW WHAT ALSO HURTS?" I yell. "EVERYTHING!" I start up my hysterical crying again.

"There has to be something we can do," Celeste whispers to Beau. "He's in so much pain."

Beau whispers back, "It's been a week. What if he's just faking for attention?"

"I CAN BLOODY HEAR YOU!" I scream at them. "I'm not faking, Beau. See, this is why I hate you so much! Just go die!" I let out another blood-curling scream. "PLEASE, SOMEONE JUST KILL ME!" I holler out to no one in particular.

"Where's Sasha?" Beau asks.

"He's in Poland," Celeste replies. "His tour doesn't end until Tuesday."

"Well, he needs to be here right now. Go call him."

Beau comes back over to me and lies down on the floor next to me. "Nick?"

"FUCK OFF!"

"Nick, we're gonna have Sasha talk to you, okay?"

"I don't even know who the bloody hell that is!"

"He's your boyfriend."

"I've never met him before!"

"You love him very much."

"AND I HATE YOU VERY MUCH."

"Nick, someone wants to talk to you," Celeste says. I hear her footsteps come closer to me. I open my eyes and she hands me a phone.

The person on the other end starts speaking in a foreign language.

"I can't bloody understand him!" I yell at Celeste. "You're not helping!"

Celeste looks sad. "You forgot how to speak Russian?"

"I FORGOT EVERYTHING, YOU STUPID BITCH!"

Everyone was silent and the only sound in the entire house was my laboured breathing.

Beau and Celeste were just staring at me.

"LEAVE ME THE HELL ALONE! GO AWAY! BOTH OF YOU!" I yell. "YOU'RE NOT HELPING AT ALL!"

Celeste nods. "Okay. Talk to Sasha. We'll leave."

She stands up and Beau stays put.

"Beau, he wants us to leave," she tells him calmly.

"I'm afraid he'll do something," he tells her.

"There's nothing lethal in here," Celeste says, taking his hand and dragging him out of the room.

Finally. Alone.

"Panda?" I hear a voice coming from the phone.

Oh, that's right. My 'boyfriend' was still on the phone.

"Yea? Hello?" I answer.

"It's me. Bamboo."

"Oh."

Something catches my eye. Celeste left her purse on the other side of the room. Perhaps there's medicine in there.

"You doing okay, Panda?" Sasha asks from, I guess, Poland.

"No," I reply.

"Do you want me to sing you something? You always like that when you're sick."

"Sure."

I begin my painful crawl across the dirty floor of the loo over to Celeste's pink Chanel purse. I try not to cry out in pain in fear that he would hear me.

He starts singing a song in Russian. I wince from the pain of moving and slowly inch my way over to the purse. I extend my arm to grab it and then pull it to me. I sit up against the wall, catching my breath. I sigh and then start pulling items out of her purse.

Tissues, make up, hand lotion, her wallet… oh my god. Is that what I think it is?

I hold the bottle of pills up to the light and try to get my eyes to focus on the label. Damn it. Not pain pills. Just her stupid pregnant lady medicine.

I continue my search.

"Nick? Are you still there?" Sasha asks.

"Yea."

"Are you feeling any better?"

"Yes, keep singing."

I toss the phone aside and feel inside her purse. My hand lands upon a small tube-shaped object and I pull it out. A syringe. Filled with morphine. Why she has it in her purse is a mystery, but I guess all doctors have random shit like that with them.

Finally. Relief.

A knock on the door. Celeste opens the door and gawks at me. "Nick? What? Wha- Is that?"

I uncap the syringe quickly and put it in my arm, pushing down on the plunger.

"NO!" she yells and dives towards me. "Beau! Beau! Get in here!"

I throw the syringe down on the floor. Everything stopped hurting.

"NICK WHY DID YOU DO THAT?!"

"It doesn't hurt anymore," I smile.

But I completely forgot about one little thing… I'm highly allergic to morphine. I feel my throat start to close up and I gasp for air, getting less and less with each gasp.

I get really dizzy and then everything turns dark.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

I open my eyes. Back in the hospital with the disgustingly happy walls.

"I hope you're happy, Nick," I hear a harsh voice. "You got what you wanted."

Beau.

I look over at him. He's standing about five feet away from my bed, his arms crossed across his chest, a not-so delightful frown on his face.

He starts walking over to me. "You managed to scare the shit out of a lot of people who love you."

"Good," I reply, closing my eyes.

"What is this attitude you're giving me, mister? Don't you even dare!"

"Oh, don't yell at me," I fake whimper. "I'm just a poor little sick baby. I didn't mean it." I give him the fakest frown ever.

Right before Beau could reprimand me, Celeste and some guy walk in the room.

Celeste smiles. "Oh my god, you finally woke up!" She runs over and starts kissing me. "We were all so worried about you, Nicky!"

The unknown guy walks over to me and kisses me on the lips. Sasha?

"How long was I asleep?" I ask, rubbing my eyes.

"You were in a coma for three weeks," Celeste tells me.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Beau slip out of the room.

Ignoring what I just saw, I widen my eyes. "Three weeks?!"

She nods. "We were all so afraid you wouldn't wake up." She starts tearing up. "That was one hell of a stunt you pulled, little panda." Celeste kisses me on the forehead again. "How do you feel? Any pain?"

I shake my head. "It doesn't hurt anymore. I just have a little headache."

Celeste smiles and nods. "Good. That's very good." Then she breaks down into sobs.

Sasha and I just stare at her. My so-called boyfriend takes the opportunity to hop in the small bed next to me and wraps his arms around me, kissing my neck. I just kinda stare at him. He looks into my eyes. "Are you okay?"

I nod. "I just… I don't really know you… I'm sorry. You seem really sweet, I just…"

"It's fine, I understand," he says and sits up.

"No, you can lie next to me… it was nice."

He smiles and lies back down, cuddling, but not too close this time.

"Are you tired?" he asks me in a whisper.

I nod. "A bit."

"We should sleep. When you feel better, we can go out somewhere together and try to get your memory back," he tells me, playing with my hair.

"Okay," I reply with a yawn.

He smiles. "Yes, we need sleep."

I close my eyes.

"We can go to Russia together," he starts softly whispering into my ear. "We can go to my house and drink hot chocolate by the fire as we watch the snow fall. It'll be so nice." He starts running his fingers through my hair. "I think you'll like it there. It will be just the two of us. We can get away from everything; the fans, the media, the entire world… just us."

I drift off to sleep as he keeps whispering.

X X X

I hop in Sasha's car.

"Have fun you two," Celeste says. "Don't get into too much trouble. Call me if you need anything. You know how to get back to our house right, Sasha? If you get lost call me. I'll have my phone on always. Oh, and make sure Nick doesn't eat anything he's allergic to and-"

I turn to Sasha. "Is she always like this?"

He laughs and nods. "Pretty much." Sasha turns to Celeste, who is still rambling away. "Good bye, Celeste." He closes the car door in her face and starts the car.

She looks at us, gives us a small smile with a wave and heads back into my house.

Sasha turns to me. "Ready?"

I nod. It's quite scary though. I know nothing about anything. I just know the inside of my house and the hospital. It's like I've never been anywhere before.

We pull out of the driveway and head down the street, out of the neighbourhood.

"Where do you want to go first?" he asks.

I shrug. "Where could we go?"

"We could go to the mall. Oh, but there might be a lot of fans… I don't know if you're ready for an ambush yet."

"Do they know… about what happened?"

Sasha nods. "The entire world knows pretty much."

"Oh," I say, looking out the window at the passing cars.

"You okay?"

"Yeah, I just find this whole thing… weird."

"It must be."

"Sasha, where are you from? You talk funny."

He laughs. "I talk funny? You do too. I'm from Russia."

"Am I from here?" I ask.

Sasha shakes his head. "You grew up in England."

"How come my parents aren't here?"

He pauses. "I think Celeste better tell you."

"Did they die? Is that why?" I ask.

"No, they're alive."

"Then why do Beau, Celeste and I live in a giant mansion all alone?"

"You have another brother. His name is Jean-Luc. But he's in Africa."

"Why is he there? And you never answered my question."

"He's on vacation there with his fiancée."

"You still didn't answer my question."

"Yes I did."

"About my parents."

Silence.

"Please, Sasha, tell me."

"They live in Europe."

"Why?"

"It doesn't matter. You're not very fond of them."

"Well why not?"

"Ehh…"

"You're ignoring the question."

He stops the car. "We're at the mall."

"That we are."

He turns off the engine and takes off his seatbelt. "Let's go."

"I'm not leaving until you answer my question."

"Fine," he replies. He opens the door and gets out, closing it behind him. He starts walking away from the car and towards the building.

"Sasha?!" I yell out after him. I open the door and get out, running after him as fast as I could go on crutches. I hate being alone.

"I thought you weren't getting out of the car," he says, sounding slightly mad.

"Oh, I see what you did there… you're mean."

Sasha laughs and pulls me into a hug. "You know I love you."

"Actually, I don't."

He frowns and lets go of me.

"I'm sorry, Sasha," I say sincerely.

Sasha shakes his head. "It's okay. It's not your fault. I know."

I grab his hand and look up at him, smiling. He smiles back. We walk into the mall, hand-in-hand and suddenly I hear a scream. I let go of his hand and look over to where the scream came from, only to see two fifteen-year-old girls running up to us.

"OH MY GOD!" one of them shrieks.

I look at Sasha. "What? Is something wrong? Why are they screaming? "

Sasha smiles at them. "Hi," he says cheerfully to them and they scream some more.

Confusion.

"Nick, you're so hot!" one of them runs up to me and grabs me, pulling me into an awkward hug.

"Uh, hi," I say, shocked.

They giggle and one turns to me. "Will you sign my boobs?!"

I look at her in disgust. Girls scare me. Boobs are even scarier. Vaginas are the scariest.

Sasha grabs my hand, "Sorry, we have to go!" and we run off into the men's washroom.

"Is it okay that I'm totally and utterly freaked out by this?" I ask him.

He smiles. "You'll get used to it, I promise. Here," He takes out a wig and a hat from his man purse, "put this on." I take it and he puts on a disguise himself.

I laugh. "You look funny as a blonde."

He kisses me. "You look adorable no matter what."  
I blush. Even though I don't know him very well, it's nice to be loved.

"How about we go get some lunch?"

Grinning, I reply, "I'd like that," and I take his hand.

I'm falling in love with this foreign hottie all over again it seems.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

As we turn into my neighbourhood, I look out at all the scenery. It looks semi-familiar but still foreign. The whole deal is messing with my brain.

"I say," Sasha starts, "we go to Los Vegas and get completely shit-faced and have the best time of our lives that we won't remember."

I look at him. Was he serious? "Umm…"

"What?" he asks, looking at me, confused.

"I'm seventeen," I tell him. "I don't think that's even legal. Unless they changed the law and I don't remember."

"No, no," he shakes his head, "we have fake IDs."

I gawk at him. "Are you serious?!"

"Nick, we do this all the time," he says, calmly. He parks in my driveway and hands me his phone. "Pictures."

I scroll through the pictures, completely horrified. "Why are we not wearing clothes in this one? And who the hell is that girl?!" I ask, pointing to the bleach-blonde slut who was only wearing lacy black knickers.

Sasha leans over to look at the phone. "Umm… I think that was a prostitute."

"Ew!" I practically throw his phone back at him. "What the fuck?!"

He looks hurt. "You love these pictures. They're in our scrapbook you made."

"We have a scrapbook?"

"You have like an entire giant box full of scrapbooks."

Perhaps this was it! Would the scrapbooks trigger my memory or something stupid and Grey's Anatomy-like that?

I practically run inside.

Sasha hollers out after me, "Where are you going in such a hurry?"

Completely ignoring him, I make my mad dash up to my room and tear up everything, looking for this magical box of scrapbooks.

While I was in the middle of my search, Sasha pops in my room. "They're in the closet."

I look at him and nod in thanks. I open my closet door and push past all of the clothes hanging up.

"The other closet," I hear him say from the entrance.

I turn around. "The _other_ closet?" I stand all the way back up and see him pointing to a small door that appeared to me as a doggie door that was in the wall, behind a box of boots. I push the box away. "You can't be serious…"

"You can fit," he says.

I take his word and slip through the tiny opening. I made it through with ease and stood back up, just taking a moment to stare in awe at the even bigger closet filled with many treasures. I hear Sasha coming into the room, so I turn around and watch him get up.

"What is this?" I ask.

"Secret closet," he replies, wiping some crap off of his jeans.

"What's in here?"

He shrugs. "All sorts of stuff."

I look in some of my boxes. There were things ranging from books to hidden stashes of money. "Who knows about this?" I ask Sasha, who was peeking through a box.

Sasha looks up. "Just us."

"My parents don't know about it?"

"Your parents don't know your name."

"They don't know my bloody name?"

He shakes his head. "They know nothing. Especially not about this closet."

I ponder this. "What's so secret?"

"You'd never tell me. You said it was too personal."

Personal? From what it seemed like, this guy was the love of my life. What was so secret that I had to keep it from him?

"Look," I hear him say, making me come out of my trance, "Faberge eggs!"

I quickly turn around. "What the shit?"

He holds up a golden egg with the most beautiful pattern on it painted with the finest colours. Sasha takes out seven more.

I take one from him and hold it delicately in my hand, careful not to hurt it. It was magnificent, the most amazing thing I'd ever seen. I look away from it and up at Sasha. Whispering, I ask, "Sasha, why the hell do I have these?"

Sasha looks at me, the same confusion present in his eyes. "I don't know… you never told me you had these."

"Put them back," I whisper, "quickly."

He does as I say.

"Why do I feel like I shouldn't have these?" I ask.

"Cause they've been lost for hundreds of years?" he suggests.

I close the box and push it behind some other smaller boxes. "I'm scared to open any other boxes. Let's pretend we never found these, okay?"

Sasha nods. "Got it."

"Do you swear you won't tell anyone?"

"I swear."

Pause. "I don't trust you."

"You can trust me."

Suspicion overwhelmed me… but not about Sasha; about myself.


End file.
